"Lucifer, you're back."

It wasn't as though he planned on being back, make no mistake about it. Yes, granted, it was Friday, and Fridays (much like every day) usually meant boring detective work in the morning, and some outrageous party (slash rave, slash orgy, slash something or other) in the evening. But somewhere down the line, fate (or Father, it was most definitely Father) decided to throw his best-kept secret back at him in a fit of raging hellfire and black headbands, and suddenly, for Lucifer Morningstar, Fridays meant something more, something special. For all intents and purposes, Fridays now meant…Sabrina.

(Sabrina, who was too sad for sixteen. Sabrina, who was too proud to look him in the eye but still stared at him wistfully when she thought he didn't notice. Sabrina, who could destroy him in every way that mattered even if she didn't know it just yet.)

Lucifer jerked his head to the side, mouth pressed to a thin line. All the while, his fingers absently worked at the cuffs of his shirt, restlessly folding and unfolding till the crisp linen was peppered with more creases than when he began. "Yes, well, slight change of plans."

The detective nodded her head, lips pursed ever so slightly. Once upon a time she might have called herself an actress, but it was a fantasy short-lived and for good reason as she stood browsing through her folders, feigning nonchalance that clearly wasn't there. "I don't suppose…a teenage daughter was in any of them?"

It was subtle yet probing, and with no more than an amused raise of his brow, Lucifer knew this was her way of collecting a debt once owed. An explanation, he promised yesterday. Even free of hell, the devil was bound by many prisons, but the greatest one was his word. (Maybe it was about time he stopped making promises).

His fingers suddenly stilled and he hummed in thought. (Pensive was the word for it, though Chloe didn't find it such a right fit for her usually flippant partner). "It's quite funny, come to think of it." His eyes drew to the sleeves undone by his hands, turned them over once, turned them over twice, somehow expecting the mess to clean itself up if he looked away long enough. "Every plan I've made, I've told myself that I had her in mind. Now that they're playing themselves out, it seems that she was never in any of them at all."

"Lucifer-"

"Wouldn't you know it, detective?" His lips pulled upwards into a smile; tight, stinging, humorless. If he hadn't already emptied out his flask on the drive to the precinct, he might have washed it away with some hard liquor. "Perhaps I've been a liar, after all."

When he returned to Linda's office after Maze pulled him away for some breakfast, he opened the door too quickly, too callously (damn the doctor and her faulty locks), and walked in on a sight that shouldn't have hurt him so much but it did. Growing up, Amenadiel used a lot of words to describe his daughter. Strong, reckless, defiant. Yet walking back into that room, none of them seemed to fit the crying girl on the couch, face buried in defeat in her hands as her body shook and trembled much like the bottles she brought crashing down the night before.

It was a miracle that she didn't catch him looking (else she would have shut her mouth completely and never spoken a breath to him again), yet the doctor did, and she quickly pulled him out into the hall before Sabrina could take notice.

("Lucifer, I need you to leave."

"But Sabrina, she's-"

"She's going to be okay. Just, go distract yourself for a while, and come back when I call. I'll explain everything later.")

The LAPD wasn't much of a distraction (though, he supposed, no place was, considering that all the world's alcohol, women, and reckless decisions couldn't erase the guilt eating away at him with every passing second), but it was familiar and constant and normal. At times like this, when the world seemed to turn on its head (and the strong, reckless, and defiant broke down crying on cheap sofas), he could do with a bit of normal.

Chloe sighed as she pulled Dan's empty chair from his desk and sat across from her partner, currently slumped over her own seat in an unnerving state of disquieted silence. For someone who never seemed unsure a day of his life, worry was not a good look on him. Still, it seemed familiar, making sense in a way it shouldn't have. It was the same look she saw on her ex-husband's face when Trixie got called into the principal's office, or when she, herself, would scrape her knees in her youth and John Decker, still dressed in his uniform's deep blues, would run over and scoop her up from the ground.

If she ever doubted that Lucifer Morningstar was a father, then the unrest in his eyes and the unbridled tension in his jaw just then proved her wrong.

The detective shook her head in disbelief. "God, I can't believe you're a dad." She rested her chin on the table while peering up at him, half-awestruck, half-bemused. "When did that happen?"

Lucifer knew she was just wondering aloud. (She knew the answer, of course. She probably read Sabrina's file last night more than a southern lady with her Bible), but he couldn't help but wonder, himself. Biologically, yes, he became a father sixteen years ago. In all the ways that mattered, though, he wasn't sure if he ever managed to become one even to this day. (What did he do, after all, other than pass on blood and powers and an excessive pinch of impulsiveness? Even God did more for His clay-mold mortal children than the devil ever did for his only begotten daughter).

Out of the corner of his eye, Lucifer saw the detective watching him with the same curiosity that must have kept her on edge since everything that happened last night. (It couldn't be helped, he supposed. Part of the reason why the detective was so good at her job was because she never ran out of questions). Still, he didn't think he could answer any of them. Not now, at least, when he had questions of his own and his imagination ran away to places that scared him more than he would care to admit.

Before the detective could even word her next sentence together in her head, Lucifer was already well on his way to changing the topic completely. "So, anything exciting happened while I was gone?" He sat straighter, crossed his legs, tried giving his most charming smile. No matter how chipper the face he put on, though, his eyes didn't light up the same and Chloe could see right through him. "Still waiting around for a good murder. Dad knows it's been too long."

Chloe paused for a moment, caught between calling him out and letting him be. (Pick a subject, any subject in the world, and Lucifer Morningstar would have something to say about it. But bring up his own child and suddenly he forgets how to speak). No other word needed to be said at the moment more than "why," but the detective fought against the syllables just begging to escape from her throat and decided to play along. "No, just the usual open and shut cases. Except…" She looked down at the folders on her lap, pretended to be busy, occupied, anything other than bothered by another one of her partner's secrets. "Dan came in early this morning, though. Kept asking about the teenage arsonist from the park."

Lucifer rolled his eyes. "It was hardly arson. There was no destruction of private property involved-" Chloe shot him a bewildered look and he actually had the decency to look contrite (clearly another first in this two-day road show of madness that seemed to have no end), cutting himself short with a clear of his throat. "Sorry. So what did you tell him?"

The detective sighed aloud, finally putting down her folders (as a prop, they were essentially pointless, anyway) to glance at him pointedly. "That I sent her home with her father."

All at once, Lucifer was overcome with a sinking feeling, and he would've called it dread but he wasn't quite sure if he'd ever felt it before. It wasn't that he was ashamed of Sabrina. No, she could burn the whole world to the ground and she'd still be his greatest pride and joy. It was more of the fact that she had not one, but two detectives on her trail now, both cutthroat and unrelenting in their own right, who could follow her blood-stained path all the way back to New England and the unholy coven that took her in when he couldn't.

(The Greendale witches were always exceptionally good at hiding, that much was true, but the times were changing and their defenses against the witch trials of old did little to protect them now. And with one of their youngest members running fast and loose with her own powers out in public, it was only a matter of time before Sabrina drew the wrong kind of attention, and the Spellmans – who did him the greatest service for over sixteen years even if they didn't know it – would be caught in the crosshairs).

And it was all because he couldn't keep a secret well enough.

"I'm assuming you also told him, then?" He looked down bitterly, worrying his bottom lip as he already half-expected the answer. "That said father is me?"

(What was he hoping for, really? He was her husband, and her friend, and her partner long before he came into the picture. Of course she told him every-)

"No."

His eyes snapped to hers so fast that it made his head spin just the slightest bit, but seeing the plain earnestness on her face almost made it worth it. "You mean-"

The detective shook her head before he could even wrap his mind around the thought. "I didn't tell him anything." Slowly, she reached for his hand across the table and gave it a reassuring squeeze. (It didn't pull on his heartstrings anymore, not the way it used to, but it was a comfort he didn't know he needed all the same). She blew out a breath and leveled her voice with a certain gentleness before softly speaking her next words. "Look, Lucifer. I get that there are some parts of your life that you're not ready to talk about yet, and I respect that. I won't push you into anything you don't want to do. But I just-I don't ever want you to feel like you have to keep secrets from me."

He grinned back at her, and subtle as it was, at least it didn't seem so forced anymore. "I know."

It would take some time, but one day he would tell her everything. He would tell her about Edward and his trickery, Diana and her gentleness, Sabrina and her smile that lit up the world more than any star he hung in the heavens. Maybe she wouldn't understand most of it (would probably accuse him of talking in metaphors, most likely), but at least she would understand him, and that was really all that mattered, wasn't it?

"Turns out you've been a parent way longer than I've been, but if you ever need any help…"

Lucifer chuckled lightly and squeezed her hand back before letting it go. "I'll know just who to call."

At the moment, though he would never admit it out loud, he was actually grateful to his Father. For whatever schemes and manipulations He had in mind when He created Chloe Decker, His son ended up with a friend. Now that could very well have been just another step in His grand plan to torment Lucifer, but right then, he found that he couldn't bring himself to care. He had other things to worry about, and the hand he was given to hold was the least of his complaints.

Almost as if on cue, Lucifer's phone began vibrating in his pocket, and he swiftly took it out to glance at the screen. "Speaking of calls," he frowned at the words written in big white font (he played it off like it was nothing, but the detective clearly heard his sharp intake of breath at Dr. Linda's name). "I'm sorry, I'm going to have to take this."

Chloe gestured for him to go ahead and swiveled her chair back to her own desk the moment Lucifer got up to walk away. (If he was going to talk through his issues with anyone, it might as well have been his therapist. The detective knew that her partner may have seemed chaotically lost at times, but he always tried to take steps in the right direction, and she could never fault him for that).

The moment he was a reasonable distance away (almost ironically, he somehow wandered back into the interrogation room where it all began), he held the phone up to his ear, heart drumming frantically against his chest all the while. "Hello? Doctor? How did it go? How's Sabrina?"

Linda had to hum in thought before she could answer, and if she had dragged on a second longer, Lucifer would have broken out his wings and flown over early L.A traffic all the way to her office, mortal onlookers be damned. "Sabrina's doing fine…all things considered. Maze took her back to the pastry shop she seemed to love so much."

"That's good." He nodded to himself. (Even as a child, the girl appeared to rest on the skinnier side, and her father had a strange inkling that the Spellmans – Hilda, in particular - must have been feeding her too much garden beans). From her tone of voice, though, Lucifer felt as though there was something the doctor was not telling him, and the both of them seemed to dance between a fine line that couldn't be crossed over a phone call alone.

He heard Linda sigh on the other end of the line, and just then, he knew it was over. Nothing pleasant was bound to come from this conversation, and deep inside, he braced himself for the worst. (It couldn't have been nice, after all, whatever it was that broke his little girl).

"Lucifer, I think you should just head over here. The things I have to say," the doctor smacked her lips together and he could just imagine her shaking her head. "They're the type I'd rather say to you in person."

Lucifer swallowed, thick and heavy, although at that point, whatever else he had to say had already turned to ashes in his mouth. "I see."

"Are you sure you're oka-"

"I'll be there as soon as I can."

Before he could even drop the call, the phone was all but trampled under his feet as he went dashing out the door. When the detective came looking for him a few minutes later, she could do nothing more than shake her head at the cracked device on the interrogation room floor and hope to God (or his father, apparently) that wherever her partner was, he knew what he was doing.

He arrived at the clinic earlier than the doctor anticipated (how he managed to evade the freeway's bottleneck in a little over five minutes was beyond her), and she nearly jumped out of her seat when he burst into the office with no warning (she had only meant to replace the door locks before, but it seemed even the hinges wouldn't stay intact for much longer, either).

"Let's make this quick, doctor. Who do I have to skin alive and feed to the vultures?"

From his demeanor alone, Linda could tell he was on edge, leagues away from the Lucifer Morningstar who bribed his way into an appointment at six in the morning. (It didn't help that his eyes were practically ablaze, and his whitened knuckles were more or less poised to punch and rip and tear apart). A chill ran down her spine at the thought that he could probably make good on his threat with no more than his bare hands.

With a frown, the doctor glanced back at her notes, scribbled with nearly unintelligible lines as she tried to keep up with Sabrina's stories. (Unlike her father, she had no affinity for talking in circles. Even as her voice broke and her eyes watered halfway through, she kept on going, determined to recount everything as she had promised. It meant quite a lot of disturbing details and disturbing people, but Linda had already guessed early on that this certain princess's life was not the type to be told in fairytales).

She blew out a low breath at all the names she scratched in bold letters along the margins. "Quite a lot of people, it would seem."

At that, Lucifer closed his eyes and muttered something darkly under his breath. One part of Linda feared that he would explode in rage right then and there, but the other part chose to believe in the devil's humanity, the same one that gave him patience and compassion and sensibilities. (She didn't know how long said humanity would hold, the moment he found out just what his daughter had to live through this past year, but she had no other option but to rely on it, all the same).

"I'm not even supposed to be telling you all this, doctor-patient confidentiality considered," she admitted, steepling her fingers as she looked at him seriously. "But since Sabrina is a minor, I'm ethically-obligated to inform her parent of any potentially-dangerous activities for her own protection. Although, I have to admit, your daughter has managed to protect herself astoundingly well up to this point."

For a moment, Lucifer's growing anger found a reprieve and his eyes crinkled just the slightest bit. (Still strong, reckless, and defiant, it turned out). "She has?"

The doctor smiled back, nodding her head. "I've known her barely four hours and she might already be one of the toughest people I've ever met. The whole black magic and hellfire thing's not too shabby, either."

"Yes, well, she got it from me."

Linda looked at him softly; his worry, his concern, his barely-restrained pride. (He tried so hard to hide it, but he was a father through and through. Sabrina was lucky to have him, even if she refused to accept it yet). "Yeah, I figured."

His amusement left as quickly as it came, however, and not two seconds later, his forehead was creased, and he was back to thumbing the cuffs of his shirt. "It must have been terrible, though, if it made her cry." His eyes shifted to her uneasily and the doctor could almost feel the restlessness coming off him in waves. "I haven't seen her cry since she was born."

("You've been gone sixteen years, what did you expect?" the doctor wanted to bite back, but she figured it was still a wound too fresh to pick at.)

"Well, a few things have happened since then." She said instead, chin tilted resolutely as she flipped back through her notes. "And God, half of these things I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy."

Lucifer grew quiet then, and Linda wasn't sure if it was guilt that silenced him, or if he had merely run out of things to say. (Looking back, it was probably a bit of both, although he wouldn't be the first to admit it out loud).

Before she could spill out everything, though, she stopped herself (Where would she even begin? The weird, cultish baptism that started it all? Or maybe even before that, when Sabrina's mother and supposed father were left for dead and she was forced to grow up in the presence of flesh-eating witches and freshly-deceased bodies inside their mortuary home?) and gave him a hardened stare. "You should know that I won't be telling you everything. Most of this…it has to come from her. When she's ready, when she trusts you, she'll tell you herself."

Lucifer appreciated what the doctor was trying to do, he really did, but sometimes he worried that she had too much hope in people. And it wasn't always necessarily bad, per se, but when it got in the way of her perspective – especially when it came to him and just how far he'd gone – at the back of his mind, he feared she'd forgotten that she was dealing with supernatural entities who could literally bend the world to their will, miles away from her usual depressed divorcees and people who shoplifted for fun.

"After I left her? Stayed away long enough for all this to happen?" He let out a faint laugh, but there was no humor left in the sound. "I wonder when that could be?"

"Sooner than you think," the doctor countered. "Sabrina has trust issues, yes, and it won't be easy to relearn that same kind of belief in people. But part of why she struggled so hard in the past is because she kept everything bottled up and tried to deal with it herself. She doesn't have to do that now, though, because she has me, and you, and maybe even Maze! The moment she realizes this, I'm telling you, it will all come much easier. You just need to have a little faith in the process."

Lucifer's face soured and he huffed out a tired breath. "Forgive me, doctor, but it seems a bit too much to ask the devil to believe in faith."

"Then believe in me. You thought I could help you, that's why you came to me this morning, right?"

(This morning already felt like a lifetime ago at that point, but for someone who'd lived through millennia, he couldn't say his memory was failing him just yet). "Well, yes," he conceded.

Linda nodded her head once and rifled through the open journal on her lap. "Good. Now you better listen up, because I've got a long list of names here, and I wouldn't want them walking around with their skin intact after what they did."

Lucifer leaned in closer to peek at her notes, and she snapped it shut before he could read anything he wasn't ready for. (More than half of Sabrina's stories made her shudder, and she knew it wasn't her place to tell them out loud. Most of them, though, the girl already managed to resolve for herself – the demons, the plague kings, the witch sisters who tried to kill her but somehow ended up as her friends. It was the things she yet to fix, however, that the therapist wanted to help with, preferably with the aid of her devilish father who had an unmatched taste for revenge).

Even with her journal sealed to a close, the doctor knew all those awful names by heart now. How couldn't she, after she heard them spat out in animosity and tears as she watched the teenage antichrist fall apart on her couch? And one by one, she would see them undone (the way they undid that poor girl's life even if they didn't know it), starting with perhaps the most wretched of them all.

She stared pointedly back at Lucifer. "What do you know about Faustus Blackwood?"